Fourteenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Abstract

This paper examines the dialectical relationship between ‘flexible-accumulation’ and cultural production (see Cohen 1978, Krim 2004, and Martin 1995). The juxtaposition of African-American and Mexican American music genres derived from the urban terrain within the ‘southwest’ rearticulate and represent the day-to-day life and historical predicament of minorities in the United States. For the purpose of this study, the imposition of the colonial labor system is explored as a culprit in the situational context from which the musical forms emerge (see Barrera 1979, Denora 2004, Lena 2006, and Sheperd 1982). In past studies (see Cerulo 1984) music construction inversely reflected high degrees of social disruption through soft, subtle, and harmonic composition; this research, however, contends that often time music genres directly reflect the turbulent social conditions of a particular socio-demographic space. More specifically, the paper posits that the two genres are sonically isomorphic to extended bouts of labor underutilization (disruption) experienced among the working and the poor. ‘Historico- geographical’ and ‘neoclassical’ theoretical frameworks are discussed. Further examination of P-Funk, mariachi and their derivatives post 1970s reinforces the historical continuity of place while shedding light on the intersection of identity, geographical space, and production. Close attention is paid to instrumentation and the folk narrative.